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Flight Centre boss Graham “Skroo” Turner has accused Transport Minister Catherine King of being responsible for higher airfares and criticised the slow return of seats on international flights for Australian travellers.
Speaking at the company’s annual general meeting in Brisbane on Wednesday, Turner said the lack of airline capacity and competition was stifling the travel agency’s recovery.
Flight Centre managing director Graham ‘Skroo’ Turner called Catherine King the “minister for higher airfares”.Credit: Dan Peled
He reiterated Flight Centre’s “strong support” for Turkish Airlines’ and Qatar Airways’ bids for additional flights to and from Australia.
“We are still concerned about the lack of available seats on services between Australia and Europe via the Middle East,” he said, claiming that “the transport minister is now known as the minister for higher airfares” within the travel industry.
Turner’s comments at the AGM were not his first on the matter: in July, he described King’s rejection of Qatar’s bid to double flights to and from Australia as “the most ridiculous decision [he’d] ever seen”.
King’s rejection was widely criticised by key groups in the aviation, travel and tourism industry – including Virgin chief executive Jayne Hrdlicka, airport chief executives and the Productivity Commission. Critics said the move to deny Qatar’s request for more flights would result in higher airfares for passengers and constrain the flow of international travellers.
King’s office has been contacted for comment.
Virgin has a codeshare partnership with Qatar Airways, which means it would have profited from the additional bilateral air rights. Virgin’s market share on the Australia, Europe and Middle East routes would have risen from 25 per cent to 27 per cent.
King’s decision sparked a Senate inquiry that recommended the government review its decision, with Qantas being the sole voice in urging the federal government to stand firm.
In September, Turner told the Senate inquiry that the government should consider introducing more “open skies” agreements with other countries to encourage airlines to increase the number of services to the country, which would lower airfares.
The inquiry, chaired by National Party senator Bridget McKenzie, attempted to call for King to appear, but she accused the Coalition of staging a political stunt.
Flight Centre, one of the biggest travel booking companies in the world, recorded $301.6 million in underlying earnings in the year to June 30, representing a turnaround of nearly half a billion dollars from its loss of $183.1 million in 2022.
For the first quarter of the 2024 fiscal year, the travel agency revealed $6 billion in total transaction value, a 20 per cent increase on the same period last year, and a 38 per cent revenue uplift.
Corporate travel represented $3.1 billion, while leisure travel continued to recover, coming to nearly $2.7 billion in total transaction value, an improvement of 20 per cent.
Turner said ongoing demand in leisure travel is coming from baby boomers and luxury travellers who are less affected by mortgage stress.
“A relatively widely-held customer view [is] that travel is non-discretionary – a priority product they are prepared to budget for and invest in every year.”
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